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Friday, November 30, 2012

With
organisations opting to create virtual teams in today’s diversified work
environment, a leader is expected to exhibit different skill-sets and a new
leadership style.

Virtual teams consisting of people spread across
different locations who communicate largely through technology tools like
emails, video conferencing, etc. are most common at the workplace today. Thanks
to the globalisation and technological advancements, people sitting across the
globe today can work together on a single project/assignment and deliver
quality results. Advantages like costeffectiveness, increased productivity,
better employee engagement, etc are making many organisations adopt this structure
at work.
However, experts say that effectiveness of the virtual
teams depends on the capabilities of the leader. Managing the virtual team is
not as easy as dealing with people whom you meet on a daily basis. A leader has
to bring in several changes to his/her management style. According to
Nandagopal Prasad, global head of partner qualification and certification, SAP
Labs India, managing a global team is a huge opportunity to enrich leadership
competencies. The most significant advantage of a global team is the
innovation, which gets fuelled due to the diversity of the team. However, he
feels that when it comes to operationally managing virtual teams, structural
differences do crop up. “This can be resolved by having a local manager for the
teams in each location or making people directly report to the manager outside
of the location,” suggests Prasad.
“Another key quality a leader of the virtual team must
possess is the ability or skill to collaborate with people without having
meetings or face-to-face interaction,” says Bhavin Turakhia, founder and CEO,
Directi. “A virtual leader must be capable of articulating himself/herself in
writing. Writing down thoughts in an appropriate manner is a must. Proactively
creating processes, which will make teams participate and share knowledge is
also the responsibility of the leader,” adds Turakhia. Satish Menon, executive
director, Geojit BNP Paribas Financial Services Ltd feels that while managing a
virtual team, a leader must take into consideration the characteristics of the
location of the team and ground realities of the workplace culture must also be
accommodated. “Interpersonal skills of the leader must be improved and
depending on the product and situation, the
leader has to deal with people differently,” opines Menon.
To be able to manage a dispersed team effectively, a
leader must bring in several changes to his/her leadership style. “Leaders have
to evolve, and think what exactly they should deliver. There are numerous
leadership theories and philosophies in this world but the only philosophy that
will work with the virtual teams will be making the workforce understand the
customers’ needs. The virtual teams and leaders would need to understand the
priority of the business and should be able to take independent actions. A
business leader should engage in helping every employee of his/her virtual team
understand that he/she has to be the leader of one’s personal domain,” says
Anirudh Dhoot, director, Videocon. “Leaders who manage across a global team
across different time zones must be flexible to work during odd hours. The
leader should not always expect his/her team to adjust to suit his/her
convenience. Clarity and timeliness of communication are critical. It could be
as trivial as adjusting the accent, speed of speech, so that people are able to
comprehend over phone or any other conferencing devices,” suggests Prasad.
Thus, virtual teams require leaders who they
can follow with trust and it is this trust, which sets the foundation for
creating excellent workplaces.

Everyone
should appraise their financial needs and be responsive to products and
services that are available in the market and which suit their requirements.
Here, we highlight some of the mistakes that are
generally committed by youth during their financial planning.

No clear goal: Everyone needs to set a financial goal and plan
accordingly for achieving that goal. For example, goals can be buying a house,
retirement planning, children’s education or marriage, wealth creation, etc. Not clear in investment objective: Today’s youth are carried away by misleading advertisements, and often
invest as per their wish. This results in deviating from their financial goals.
They do not map assets like mutual funds, insurance, fixed deposits, etc, to
their future goals.

Keeping money idle in savings account: Due to a frantic work environment and indolence otherwise,
monthly savings accumulate over time in bank accounts. Suddenly, people realize
that there is too much money lying idle in their account. This leads to impulse
buying and affects their financial goals. Delay in retirement planning: Delay in retirement planning will lead to
additional outflow later.

Getting
into bad debts and loans: Most debts can be avoided by
postponing a decision to buy something. Whenever the loan’s interest rate goes
up, the worries associated with it also go up. Retaining the same EMI and
increasing the loan tenure leads to a default, and at times also affects cash
flow. High risk or no risk: Individuals are either risk-averse or risk-seeking
by nature. Taking risks is not gambling, but one needs to balance it
judiciously.

Ignoring insurance: Today, most of the youth are under-insured and
financially under-protected. Insurance helps in protecting financial goals. t
Back-up plan: In order to achieve their financial goals, one should have a
back-up plan in case of a reduction in income, retrenchment or business loss. Unwilling to discuss money matters with family members: This will result
in upsetting their financial goals since their cash flow will be affected in
case of any emergency expense.

Liquidity:
Most people lock more money in
illiquid assets, or maintain too much cash. They should periodically look into
this in order to achieve their financial goals. Inflation bites: Many people save instead of investing, which leads to
unpreparedness for inflation. N C Ramesh The author is a Chennai-based
financial advisor ETSWA 121127

Hoping
for the husband’s input on every domestic decision? Be careful what you wish
for

AFTER SEVERAL years of marriage, I
have realised that calling my husband, ‘the man of the house’ is a complete
misnomer. To begin with, he is hardly at home, the work consuming a good 10-12
hours of a weekday. Secondly, he seems to believe that the house is an
automated entity that cleans and repairs itself. It is messy when he leaves it
in the morning, and neat and orderly when he returns. It is almost as if some
fairy godmother has waved a magic wand over the place. Wet towels left on the
bed have vanished, the dust on the dresser has disappeared and dirty breakfast
dishes have been transformed into clean dinner plates. Yet, he has no curiosity
about this magic and is completely oblivious to the finer details of running a
household.

As a writer and consultant, I work
out of home. The work part is conveniently forgotten and since I am at home, I
usually end up taking care of the household chores along with typing out a
client proposal, trying to think of the next plot turn for my novel and helping
our daughter write a Hindi poem.

Meanwhile, my husband works hard by
hanging around in office trying to look busy in front of his laptop or catches
up on sleep during long office meetings. While we both don’t literally have to
get our hands dirty thanks to the domestic help available in this part of the
world, I still try to involve my husband in crucial domestic decisions so he
can feel that he is a part of the household. That is the least he can do by way
of contribution.

“What can we do to get the hardwater
stains out of the bathroom tiles? Nothing is working.” I asked once.

“Googleit,” he said helpfully, as
though it were a new brand of high strength cleaner.

“Should we buy a front-loading or a
top-loading washing machine?” “Googleit.” “We need new curtains. Let us go
shopping this weekend. There is a sale on at Fine Furnishings.” “Googleit.” It
was only when I yanked the iPhone out of his hands and said, “Maybe I should
marry Google and move in with it” that he looked up and said, “D..uh?” His eyes
had the glazed look that comes on when I mention anything that needs to be done
around the house.

When I finally dragged him to the
furnishing shop, he spent most of the time on his phone, looking up and giving
a thumbs up sign at every piece of cloth I showed him. Then after doing a
harrowing shortlisting process on my own, I asked, “Should we go with the cream
silk with peach coloured sheers that will go well with our furniture but could
look dirty soon or the dark brown one which will not show the dirt but it might
make the room look a bit dull?”

“Whichever,” he offered
magnanimously.

I stomped out of the shop while he
adopted an aggrieved long suffering look.

I recently moaned about this to a
friend during one of our complain-about-the-husband sessions.

“He doesn’t care about the house at
all. It is as though he is a transient visitor who is only interested in the
food. He might as well live in a hotel.”

“Lucky you,” said the friend. “I
have one who is obsessive compulsive about everything that goes into the house.”

“But you are so lucky,” I insisted.
“I know that your husband fixes all the electrical appliances himself, hammers
nails for putting up pictures and he has even shared his secret recipe for
making a cleaning mixture to get rid of grease stains on the kitchen chimney.”

“Oh, you don’t know the half of it.
He scolds the maid for not cleaning the fans properly and insists on doing it
himself with me holding on to the ladder. He spots stray cobwebs that would
escape the scrutiny of Sherlock Holmes. When others go abroad, they bring back
perfumes and handbags for their wives. He goes to the supermarket and brings me
a set of kitchen towels and a super-saver six-pack of Windex.” She wore the
harried look of a long-term sufferer.

“But that’s good, isn’t it.” I
muttered.

“That’s what you think. Five months
ago, we decided to get new curtains. First he drew up a list of all shops in
Gurgaon. Then we visited each one and collected swatches of cloth. He then made
an Excel spreadsheet and compared different prices and material and decorative
impact. He even interviewed my friends on their choice of material. Nothing
seemed good enough. Now he wants to visit Delhi shops. By now, I don’t care if
we have curtains. I want to live in a hotel.”

I think I will go to Fine
Furnishings and pick up those curtains... by myself.

Holidays almost always come with
the headache of expenses. But for budget backpacker Animesh Rawal, travelling
is all about maximum fun at minimum cost. He tells Shikha Kumar how he
travelled four continents in just `2 lakh

Visitors to Animesh Rawal’s blog
are greeted with the tagline, “The travel blog of a kanjoos Indian
backpacker”. In 2008 that he undertook his first round-the-world trip. It
lasted 10 months. When he came back and tried to fit into the corporate rat
race, he realised, as he writes on his blog, “travel had struck a fatal blow
to his career.” He decided to quit his job. His reasoning was simple: “A job
might take me to the USA or Europe but it definitely won’t take me to
Guatemala.”
Last year, Rawal took up the ‘Do peti’ challenge – a trip around the world,
completed on two lakh rupees and in six months. He explains, “Two lakh rupees
is the difference between the prices of an entry level and mid-level car. I
had colleagues who owned these cars and complained to me that they could
never afford a trip like mine.” After elaborate planning, Rawal zeroed in on
his route – India, Middle East, Europe, North America, South America, North
America, Asia, India.
East to West
In the beginning, there was a cheap, one-way ticket. A ticket for Rs10,000
brought him to Damascus, Syria. “I wanted to go overland as much as possible
so from Syria, it was overland to Turkey, then Greece, followed by Italy,
Spain and Germany,” he said. His budget was about 10 Euros a day. He hardly
spent on accommodation, choosing to make use of hospitality exchange websites
like couchsurfing.org or staying in inexpensive hostels. For food, he relied
on local street food and supermarkets. “I only chose hostels that had a
kitchen,” he said. “I also tried to cook at least one meal each for my
hosts.”
From Syria, he travelled to Turkey by road. In Turkey, he realised the
cheapest way to reach Greece was by flight (50 Euros). Greece to Italy was
completed by boat. Since this was less a conventional holiday and more of a
challenge, he went where the cheapest route took him. “I found popular places
like the Colosseum in Rome or Hagia Sofia in Istanbul very dull and gave up
after standing in line for 30 minutes,” he said. “I loved cities ancient Roman
cities like Pompeii. It’s a fantastic view into what Roman life was like in
the first century.” The travel expenses of this leg cost around Rs25,000.

The Great American
Road Trip
From Frankfurt, Germany, Rawal flew to New York (ticket cost: Rs 13,000). In
New York, he stayed with a friend. In Pennsylvania, WWOOF (World Wide
Opportunities on Organic Farms), which puts volunteers upon in farms, took
care of three weeks of Rawal’s accomodation. “It’s a great opportunity to
connect with people and get an insight into the kind of life they have,” he
said. When travelling within the US, he usually travelled with others and
split the fuel cost. So a trip from Washington DC to Texas cost him around Rs
4,000. From Texas, he took a bus to Mexico (Indians don’t need a visa if they
have a valid American visa and are staying for less than a month).
Mexican Wave
Mexico was one of the places which was cheap on most counts. “The buses that
traverse in Southern Mexico are very cheap,” said Rawal. He makes a special
mention of the yummy yet inexpensive food with its tangy and spicy flavours.
“Every province had their own way of making the tacos, burritos and the
tortillas. Plus, I was brave enough to try the street food,” he said. In
touristy terms, Pulum, with its many ruins, was the highlight for Rawal of
the Mexican leg of his trip.
From Mexico, he went to Guatemala and Nicaragua. In Nicaragua, he stayed in a
beautiful beach resort for no charge because he did some website work for
them. From Nicaragua, he flew back to New York and from there, he returned to
Mumbai by air. The trip had begun in March 2011 and ended in October, and he
had exceeded his budget by just about Rs 20,000.
Discovery Channel
While on the trip, Rawal realised certain places, like Turkey, were more expensive
than he’d anticipated. Bus journeys in Turkey cost no less than Rs1,500
rupees, which was more than he’d budgeted for. There were pleasant
discoveries too. Hostels and food in Germany, for instance, were surprisingly
cheap.
The trip was not devoid of troubles. While in Barcelona, Rawal’s passport and
laptop were stolen and he had to cough up approximately Rs 14,000 for a new
passport. However, this did not deter his enthusiasm. The travel bug is still
in his blood and currently, Rawal is working in Greece.
“By taking on this challenge, I just wanted people to know that it’s all a
matter of priorities. One can travel on as little or as much as they want,”
he said.